It used to be staffing companies and recruiting firms were the only ones with all the information, the "Golden Rolodex" of candidates and companies. Now our clients and candidates have access to much of the same information. Social media sites are a great tool but some clients are hiring their own internal recruiters to mine these same sites for candidates.

So what can we provide that they still need and how do we show our value? What are companies doing and what could we be doing? Finding people is easy, it is the information overload we all struggle with and how to best handle that. Come hear about some simple techniques that you can implement when you get back to the office.

April 28, 2011

It might surprise you to know that asking questions of your own during your job interview is just as important as answering them. Candidates spend a lot of time on interview preparation, and they should. Doing your research on the company, bringing your 30/60/90-day plan, and preparing compelling answers to interview questions (as well as having some stories to back them up) are guaranteed ways to have a good interview. But one thing that will make you stand out from other candidates is asking questions.

Asking questions tells you what you need to know.

After all, you’re interviewing the company, too. Is it going to be a good fit for you? Is it going to be somewhere you’ll be able to grow and advance your career? To find out these answers, you’ll ask questions about the company, the mission, the typical work day, travel schedules, and so on—just don’t ask about the salary or the vacation!

April 26, 2011

You’ve made it. All your hard work has paid off, and you’re officially The Big Cheese. Now it’s time to go out and find a great job that bears both the responsibilities and rewards of being a top executive. The trouble is, depending on which company is advertising a job, you may be applying to be CEO, Director, or President. How should you title your resume in order to be picked up by recruiters and hiring managers?

Target a specific sector

If your job search is aimed at leading a certain size company in a particular industry, it will be fairly easy for you to determine an appropriate title for your resume. One tactic is to copy the search words you use to look for jobs appropriate for your experience. For instance, if you are looking for Vice President positions that require an M.B.A., your title might be “Senior Vice President” and you would include M.B.A. after your name, as in “John Doe, M.B.A./ Senior Vice President”.

As a candidate, it means there are more job openings, you can expect multiple job offers and recruiters will be calling you more. So as a candidate, you need to make sure you are networking, your resume is ready and you start polishing your interview skills.

Also you need to expect more competition for jobs, because not only will all the unemployed be looking, the one who stopped looking will return and those who are working but don’t like their jobs or want something new will start looking because there will be more job opportunities that will get them excited.

As a hiring manager, this means candidates will have more choices, so if you are not selling your opportunity they will move on to the one that sounds better. In addition, as the number of jobs increase there will be less fully talented/qualified people for each job.

April 21, 2011

If you’re thinking about creating a master resume, you’re on the right path to writing amazing resumes when you apply for specific jobs. Master resumes allow you to have one place to store all of the details of your career so that you can easily find specific details to add to submission resumes.

Though the master resume is one you won’t submit, to help keep your information organized, it’s a good idea to format it. Here are some formatting ideas to consider as you create your own:

Create Sections That Correlate With Submission Resumes

A great way to keep your master resume organized is to create the same sections that you would use in the resumes you will eventually submit. Depending on the types of resumes you send out (i.e., functional vs. chronological), you may need different sections. In this case, you could either add all of the unique sections to your master resume, copying some information to both sections, or simply create a functional master resume and chronological master resume.

April 18, 2011

When I started University, my faculty passed out a sheet of paper to all of the students that contained a set of 10 rules for being successful in the business world. And while I have long since lost the sheet, there is one rule I remember very clearly:

It’s better to be respected than liked.

While this made some sense to me at the time, I have only recently started to appreciate exactly what it means for your career. Now that I have been in the corporate world for a few years, it has become easier to see the link between how people view you and your career advancement.

There are many ways/reasons for people to like you. You could:

1. Be a genuinely nice person 2. Be social 3. Do favors for others without any expectation of favors back 4. Make people smile or laugh

But ultimately, being liked in itself will not advance your career. Do to this, you need to be respected. And in my opinion, there are only two ways to gain the respect of others:

April 16, 2011

Master resumes offer many benefits, including allowing you to store all of the details of your career in one place and helping you organize your job search. If you are interested in making the most of this document, take a look at five ways to write a great one:

1. Find Your Old Resumes

One easy way for you to create a great master resume is to start by finding all of your old ones. It’s probable that over the years, you’ve developed and discarded dozens of resumes. Dig them out, not just for the old job descriptions but also for the skills. You might be surprised by some qualifications you’ve forgotten about that might apply to jobs you may want to pursue in the future.

2. Think About All Aspects of Your Career

It’s also good to sit down and contemplate all of the aspects of your career, including any committees you may be a part of in relation to your job. Anything that you participate in that could help you to excel in a job later in your career can be added to your master resume now for future reference.

April 12, 2011

Finding a job, no matter where the economy is at, is a stressful and overwhelming experience. Did you realize that with some simple planning, you can quickly and easily glide through the entire process, with little effort?

Here are the top three job search tips for individuals who are currently working, but looking for new options in their career.

1. Get a resume tune-up.

Your resume should serve as a quality piece of marketing literature.... selling your skills and experience to prospective employers. If it's not perfect, and I'm referring to its format, grammar, content and flow, you will prevent hiring managers and recruiters from contacting you to set up the interview. They will "pass on you."

April 09, 2011

As a New Graduate looking for an Entry Level Job, it rarely pays off to negotiate for a better job offer.

While everyone loves a great story about the person who successfully negotiated for a higher starting salary/bigger bonus/more vacation, the truth is that you likely don’t have enough leverage at this stage in your career.

Given the number of new graduates who are looking for work, the competition between equally qualified candidates is extremely high. Why would a company pay more for you, if you don’t have anything that sets you apart from other candidates?

The reality is, they won’t. This means that you are more likely to lose the offer altogether than you are to gain anything from trying to negotiate. Are you willing to take that risk? In most situations, you won’t have any leverage in negotiations until after you have been in the work force for a few years.

The only time that I might recommend negotiating is if you are at the top of your class and you are being sought after by multiple companies. If this is you, you may have some success in your negotiations.

April 04, 2011

Social Media has become an integral part of the way we live and work. It is hard to imagine that it is only twenty years since the Internet was created. According to Nielsen research, social network traffic grew by 43% from June 2009 to June 2010. Social network activity now dwarfs online games, email and search as the number one activity. Every single day more people are also now turning to their social networks, as the preferred way to find jobs.

Managers need to realise that social media is much more than Facebook or LinkedIn. There is also a level of skepticism and confusion about the value of social media. A communications manager recently told me that she was one of the first people to get a Twitter account, after attending a conference in New York. Currently she still has no active account, and perhaps due to her confusing initial experience, is now a social media skeptic.

The astronomical growth of social media has created new ways for companies and candidates to connect online. In the late seventies, the movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind, was written and directed by Steven Spielberg. The movie used Hynek's scale of three types of encounters: sightings; observations of UFO's; and human observation of animate beings. Similarly, the involvement of Human Resources with the phenomena of Social Media can best be described and summarized at three distinct levels or types of encounters: compliance; sourcing; and engagement.

About & Connect

Welcome to the Minnesota Headhunter Blog. My name is Paul DeBettignies (pronounced De-Bett-ingz).

I started writing in 2005 to share thoughts and ideas I had as an IT recruiter.

Since then I expanded this site to include MN IT and recruiter jobs, links to Minnesota business news and promote the local tech community.

I am the Principal of Minnesota Headhunter, LLC a Minneapolis IT search firm and a frequent local and national speaker and article contributor on recruiter, HR, career, networking and social media topics.